"The prosecution against Abacus appears to be Mr. Vance’s only mortgage-related prosecution against a bank since he won election as Manhattan district attorney and took office in January 2010."
Uhm... I deeply hate pulling the race card, but I would be tempted for this individual. Particularly, when the prosecution's star witness is the fraud master himself.
If I had to guess, it probably had a lot to do with them being relatively weak, small, mostly serving an immigrant community, and having no connection to the local power structure. Going after JP Morgan would be, well...awkward. Going after Abacus was easy.
It's not because Jamie Dimon is white and Thomas Sung is not; that was just a more-or-less inevitable consequence. (In employment law, this is called a "disparate impact".)
It almost seems to me like this one fell into their laps. They might not have been in their sights initially but upon the initial fraud investigation they must have identified a weakness in them. Maybe their willingness to cooperate which I imagine is unheard of in that sector, seemingly?
No, I think he picked them because they didn't contribute to him and were an easy target. Attacking them also wouldn't hurt any of his wealthy friends.
His actual reasoning is sadly irrelevant to how you mount your defense.
I think one possible defense they could use is to insinuate that they were attacked because they are minorities and serve primarily minorities. Its the classic definition of "pulling the race card".
I doubt it was the actual reason, but the actual reason, sadly, is not very important in a PR war in politics.
Uhm... I deeply hate pulling the race card, but I would be tempted for this individual. Particularly, when the prosecution's star witness is the fraud master himself.